Tag: negative self-talk

What’s that saying? It takes three weeks to develop a habit? Or maybe it’s now 66 days? Whatever length of time it takes to develop one though, it takes just as long or even longer to get rid of it, especially when it’s a bad habit.

Depending on when you started running, you may have brought some not so great mental habits from your regular life to your running life. Such habits include black and white thinking patterns, perfectionism, crashing under pressure, and avoiding discomfort. For me, I’ve struggled with all of those things. As early as five years old, I can remember being afraid of slides, swings, and any type of movement that took me away from my “normal” state of being. Read more >>

Last winter I trained hard, perhaps harder than I’ve ever trained before, for my key race: the Fargo Marathon. Eighteen weeks of dedication, tears, joy, and fatigue carried me to race day. I had lofty race goals, but I felt strong and ready. As I’ve talked about before, I fell far short of my goals, and instead of clocking a personal best that day, I ended up with a personal worst.

I found myself in the Depths of Despair after that race, and my own negative self-talk kept me locked there and had a larger impact on my running and self-confidence than I care to admit. If you’ve ever had a really terrible race or bombed a workout, I’m sure you’ve found yourself there too.

With time, however, I gained perspective, and I realize now what I needed then was a whole lot more self-compassion.

Mindfulness is about noticing all of the thought bubbles, much like watching clouds in the sky.

The mindfulness movement has been around for ages, but it’s only recently that it’s made its way into the mainstream. Mindfulness is defined as intentional awareness, or intentionally paying attention to the environment around you. It involves observing your environment through the five senses and more importantly, not judging the thoughts and feelings as good or bad as they occur.

Instead of reacting to a thought or feeling, we learn through mindfulness to become an observer. As a result, we develop a new relationship with thoughts and feelings. Of particular value to competitive runners like us, is learning to make nice with discomfort.

That’s right, no matter what your preconceived notions are, mindfulness is not just about being a happier runner. Learning how to be mindful can help even the most competitive runner race better!

I recently found myself standing on the starting line of the 44th annual Portland Marathon. Along the journey to that moment, I did all the right things. I signed up with a coach and followed her workouts to a tee. I pushed myself to hit paces in my workouts that I used to think were unreachable. I believed I was capable of running a 3:25 marathon, which would be a ten minute PR.

It was time to stop doubting myself and to trust in my training, but as I stood there I knew in that moment that a ten minute PR was not lying before me on those 26.2 miles of Portland road. What was this self-doubt? Was it nerves? Was it self-sabotage? Whatever it was, I felt deep within myself that this would not be that breakthrough race I have been striving for.

At that point, I still had a few minutes and 26.2 miles to run and more importantly decisions to make. Read more >>

I admit it: I love those lists of things successful people think or don’t think. As a competitive runner, I’m always looking to improve the little things to take my running to the next level, especially when it comes to my mental game. Anyway, I’m sure you know these lists I’m talking about. The latest one I noticed making the social media rounds is “Mentally Strong People: The 13 Things They Avoid,” although there are many others that contain similar advice.

After reading one of these lists I often think, “Aha! Yes!” It at once makes me feel all awesome that it reinforces a few things I already know, but also feels like it contains the missing thought patterns I need to become a mental beast on the race course. So, there I am printing it out and slapping it up on my bulletin board. Then for the next 45 minutes I think all the mentally tough mo-fo things I can think in place of the automatic wussy internal banter. But inevitably that list gets buried behind other lists: how to be a better parent; how not to feel holiday guilt; how to keep your house clean even when you’re a complete and utter incompetent domestic.

And with one turn of the calendar page, I’m right back where I started. Back to my old thought patterns and apparently completely inadequate behaviors. Yet, I’ve done this over and over – until now. I don’t know what it was about the last list I read, but that (darn cliché) lightbulb turned on over my head (despite my wish for more novel symbol of illumination).

Those lists aren’t going to fix my mental weaknesses. And they’re not going to fix yours either. Read more >>

Together, we’ve taken a big leap: we’ve resolved to dream big and to stop being embarrassed about it. Yeah! But that is just a first step to realizing our big goals. Ladies (and you 2 gentlemen readers), we have more work to do to become the runners we dream of becoming.

Today I’m going to put on my self-help guru hat and discuss how the power of positive thinking can change your life in JUST. SEVEN. DAYS! Ok, maybe it’s not that amazing, but positive thinking, particularly learning to believe you are now who you want to be can go along way with helping you achieve your crazy big dream goals.

So come along with me and let’s fake it until we make it! Read more >>